Nightmares Under A Midnight Moon
by Lover of Angelus
Summary: All he could see was blackness and on his tongue he tasted the blood and bile and dirt and ash of those he himself had slaughtered in the name of country and King. RoyEd. YAOI.


**Title **: Nightmares Under A Midnight Moon

**Disclaimer **: Me no own, You no sue.

**Warning **: Yaoi

**Note **: "Reviews" equal "Author Crack." Moral of the story: give me my fix... please?

**Note2** : Done to the prompt of "black." I came up with 37 words. This is what happened when I put them all together.

**Note3 **: **_Bold italics_** are flashbacks

-z-

Black eyes gaze down at the paper.

Roy Mustang knows the outlook is bleak, the darkness of the night raping all good feelings from the work day. Standing on the balcony of his room, he closes his eyes and mentally searches for the comfort he wants, needs.

_**Screams on a gentle breeze.**_

Pain at his temple and burning in his chest as he tries to remember how to breathe.

**_The stitches tear and blood pours between his fingers_.**

He cries out and falls to his knees, clutching at a wound that was physically healed a long, long time ago.

_**The knife slid in and out, in and out, in and out and Mustang sees the hunger on that nameless and featureless face.**_

He leans against the door and tries to keep from shattering into a million different pieces.

_**Hysterical giggling as he smears blood on the wall, the copper-like taste is in his mouth and he knows that this is the end.**_

Roy licks his lips, he can still taste the blood and part of him wonders when one the servants will show up.

As if on cue, there's knocking-

**Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat_. A baby's crying somewhere and there is a nothingness that is beginning to consume him._**

"Sir?" it's Tina, the woman who was serving his family since before he could remember.

A strangled cry flies past his lips instead of the reassuring words he had intended.

_**The kid has a gun and all he had to do was pull the trigger and the Flame Alchemist would be no more. But Roy's will to live outweighed the guilt he knew would follow. So he snapped his fingers and lived another day.**_

Tina bustled in, a sharp intake of breath alerting Roy to her presence.

"Sir," it was a quiet whisper, filled with despair.

"I'm fine," Roy said through gritted teeth, eyes closed tight against the scene of his first kill.

"Liar," she whispered. She knelt beside Roy and tried to help him up. He slapped her hands away gently. "You Mustangs and your pride," she tsked.

_**He waved a long finger at Roy and shook his head.**_

_**"Don't feel bad," Archer said. "In fact, it's better not to feel anything at all." A shrug of his shoulders as he leaned in closer to Roy. "They're nothin' but dirty animals anyway. Take pride in your work, 'kay?"**_

Roy roughly shoved Tina away the moment he felt it coming; he barely managed to keep vomit off her skirts.

He heard her whispering his name and he thought he felt her hand on his back, an attempt at comfort. However, all he could see was blackness and on his tongue he tasted the blood and bile and dirt and ash of those he himself had slaughtered in the name of country and King.

He's laughing now, still gagging, and that damned baby is still crying.

_**"The guilt will never go away," said Hughes, his eyes dancing quietly in the firelight. "It'll become more tolerable though as you find more things to distract yourself with."**_

_**"Like what?" the question was accentuated by a swig from the whiskey bottle.**_

Tina cursed under her breath before scurrying out of the room.

Mustang's eyes followed her out. When she was gone, he let himself crumple. Falling onto his back, he looked up at the stars and shivered in the gentle breeze that smelled of charred flesh.

There was a gaping wound in his soul, the kind that would close up for a little while before being savagely ripped open. It was a hole that few had tried to mend, but never could finish due to whatever possible circumstance.

"Please, sir!" Tina's voice was firm but desperate and some place far off.

Roy's head lolled to the side, his eyes staring unfocused at the door of the master bedroom.

_**Meas gives his friend a side-long glance and a wink.**_

**Crap_, Roy thinks._**

_**"You," Hughes pointed a finger at his friend, "need to find yourself some blonde little firecracker."**_

"Sir!" Tina is closer this time and whoever it is she's chasing is already at the door.

"Roy?!" the voice sends a shock wave through the General.

_**"When did you figure it out?" Mustang narrows his eyes at his friend.**_

_**"Just now," Hughes claps Roy on the back. "I was just suspicious before. I think you--**_

"Ed?" Roy's voice was hoarse as his door was jerked open and he was charged at by a blur of gold and red and black.

_**--he would make a wonderful pair."**_

_**"Ed needs a girl his own age," Roy shakes his head, sometimes hating his conscience as he took another swig.**_

_**"As if any girl his own age would, or could, understand the things he's seen and done," there's regret in Hughes' voice. "You should know better than that."**_

_**Roy snorts, shaking his head and staring into the fire. He takes a sip.**_

"What're you doing here?" Mustang sits up weakly, pushing away his memories and all the darkness that he had let come over him.

Ed stops in front of the General, skidding to a halt before bending over to catch his breath.

"Your place has too many stairs," he growled, his breathing slowing into a normal rhythm.

"I apologize, next time I'll make my place more convenient for wayward subordinates to navigate," Roy's words were empty. "Again I ask, why are you here?"

Ed blushed and looked away, out over the vast horizon toward the distant city lights of Central. "Something didn't feel right," he finally admitted with a shrug of his shoulders.

Roy quirked an eyebrow, wordlessly telling him to explain in more detail.

"I had this dream that--" Edward's voice trembled. "You were dying. There was something wrong with your legs and you were trying to crawl away, _but couldn't_. I called out to you but you didn't hear me and you were screamin' and snappin' and everything around us was on fire."

Roy chuckled to himself.

"It's not funny," Ed glared down at the general, hands on his hips and scowl in place. "I woke up screaming and Al and Winry almost had heart attacks!"

"So how did you get here?" Roy rose to his feet, tiredly making his way to the bathroom.

"Taxi."

Roy grunted as he gargled mouthwash. After spitting, he folded his arms across his bare chest and leaned against the wall. Allowing his eyes to run over Ed's form.

Edward squirmed and fidgeted under that black-eyed scrutiny.

**_"You know I'm right," Hughes grinned, a seriousness in his voice that hadn't been there before. "You two clicked in a way I've never seen before. I saw it happen when that kid shouted after you, declaring that he'd become a state alchemist. I watched that flicker of _whatever-the-hell-you-call-it _go through your eyes. And I watch now as you look over him and protect him even when he isn't aware of you doing it."_**

_**"I'm his superior officer, it's my job," Roy stared down at his whiskey.**_

**"_Roy," Hughes rolled his eyes, "wake up."_**

**_"I am awake," there was more emotion in his voice than Hughes expected. "It's why I never claimed him from the beginning._"**

When Roy realized that Ed was almost right in his face, it was too late. His body acted of it's own accord. Edward squeaked in surprise as two strong arms scooped him up and a foreign set of lips crashed down on his own.

_**Hughes' eyebrows shoot straight up at the confession.**_

_**Casting another sidelong glace at his friend, Roy took a swig from the bottle.**_

They both stare at the ceiling afterwards. Roy clutching Edward's smaller body against his own, trying to convey that _something_ that Hughes had been talking about all that time ago.

They fell asleep like that, Edward unknowingly taping and gluing bits of Roy's tattered soul together.

_**"Hate and anger," Hughes' voice was a mere whisper, "it's all this world has to offer to people like you and I. Love is so fleeting, so elusive, so when you have that chance encounter, grab It and never let go."**_

_**"What if I don't?"**_

_**"Rage," a dry chuckle, "and pain and a dark abyss you won't be able to crawl out of. You need that boy's innocence before it's corrupted by this life. Take it, Roy, use it as you armor."**_

_**"Isn't that wrong? Using Ed like that?"**_

_**"Ed needs you just as much as you need him. He needs your protection. Let your rank and physical strength serve as shield and sword for the kid."**_

_**"Never knew you could be so poetic," Roy grins at his friend. Hughes laughs out loud and squeezes Roy's shoulder.**_

_**"Whiskey does that to me."**_

_**Roy's face grew serious as another thought hit him.**_

_**"Not all that boy's innocence could save me from the pit."**_

They only come together on the really bad nights. When there is no hope and the moon's light is too bright and the wind carries the sounds of the screaming and the dying and the _rat-tat-tat-tat-tat_ of scared and bloodthirsty soldiers.

_**"You speak as if you're the only one here who's sinned," Hughes rolled his glass in his hands, a bitter smirk on his face. "Every time I look at Elicia, I'm reminded of I've done. But if I let it get to me, I leave her vulnerable."**_

_**"How long do you think we could last?" Roy's genuine curious made Hughes pause to really consider his answer.**_

_**"Till the nightmare stop."**_

_**"So, never?" a dry chuckle from Roy.**_

_**"So never," Hughes lifts his glass.**_

_**"So never," Roy does the same with his bottle and they drink to all their endless nightmares.**_

-z-


End file.
